If your furnace or AC is getting up there in years, sooner or later the question comes up: should you stick with a gas furnace, or switch to a heat pump? We hear it a lot from homeowners in Hurricane, Teays Valley, Scott Depot and Winfield, and there isn’t one right answer for every house. Here’s a plain-English look at how each system works and what to think about before you decide.
How a gas furnace heats your home
A gas furnace burns natural gas to heat air, and a blower pushes that warm air through your ductwork. Furnace air comes out of the vents feeling hot, which a lot of folks like on a cold January morning. A furnace only handles heating, so it’s paired with a separate central air conditioner for summer.
How a heat pump heats your home
A heat pump doesn’t burn fuel. It moves heat. In the summer it pulls heat out of your house, just like an air conditioner. In the winter it runs in reverse, pulling heat from the outdoor air and bringing it inside. One system handles both heating and cooling, so in West Virginia it hardly gets a day off.
On our colder mornings, a heat pump often leans on backup heat to keep up. That’s usually electric heat strips, or a gas furnace in what’s called a dual-fuel setup. Short bursts of backup heat are normal. Heat pump air also tends to feel cooler at the vent than furnace air, even when everything’s working right.
Five questions to help you decide
1. Do you have natural gas at the house?
If gas service is already run to your home, a furnace (or a dual-fuel system) is an easy option to keep. If your home is all-electric, a heat pump is often the natural fit.
2. Are you replacing the AC too?
Since a heat pump heats and cools, it replaces both your AC and your main heat source. If your air conditioner and furnace are both near the end, that’s a good time to compare a heat pump against a new furnace-and-AC pair.
3. How does your family like the heat to feel?
Some people love the blast of hot air from a furnace. Others prefer the steadier, gentler warmth of a heat pump. It’s worth thinking about before you buy.
4. What does your ductwork look like?
Both systems usually run through the same ducts. If some rooms never get comfortable, that can point to duct problems worth fixing either way. For an addition, garage or bonus room with no ducts at all, a ductless mini-split (a type of heat pump) can be a good fit.
5. How old is your current system?
Many homes in Hurricane, Teays Valley and Scott Depot still have the equipment they were built with. If yours is around 15 years old or more and needing frequent repairs, it’s a good time to look at your options, before it quits on the coldest night of the year.
What about doing both?
For some homes, the best answer is a dual-fuel system: a heat pump that handles most of the year, paired with a gas furnace that takes over on the coldest days. We install dual-fuel systems and are happy to talk through whether one makes sense for your home.
Don’t forget the upkeep
Whichever way you go, regular tune-ups help your system run the way it should. A heat pump works year-round, so it benefits from two checkups a year, one in the spring and one in the fall. Our Twice-a-Year maintenance plan covers exactly that, starting at $20 a month, and our tune-up checklist covers gas furnaces, electric furnaces, heat pumps and central air.
Get an honest answer from a local team
BMS Heating and Cooling has been family-owned and local since 2004. We install and service all brands of furnaces, air conditioners and heat pumps. We’re not going to push a new system if a repair makes more sense. If replacement is the right call, we’ll give you a free replacement estimate over the phone and walk you through your options. New systems we install come with a 1-year BMS labor warranty and a 10-year manufacturer parts warranty when the equipment is registered, and financing through Wisetack lets you spread out the cost.
Trying to decide between a heat pump and a furnace? Call BMS Heating and Cooling at (304) 757-4822 for a free replacement estimate over the phone, or book online.